


"Merlin's Dreams"

by Adarog (RembrandtsWife)



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Dreams, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-19
Updated: 2009-10-19
Packaged: 2017-10-13 20:29:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RembrandtsWife/pseuds/Adarog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morgana isn't the only one who has dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	"Merlin's Dreams"

**Author's Note:**

> A bit of messing around with other versions of the legends and putting them in BBC!Merlin's head.

  
  
  
  
**Entry tags:**   
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[fic](http://adarog.livejournal.com/tag/fic), [frc](http://adarog.livejournal.com/tag/frc), [gen](http://adarog.livejournal.com/tag/gen), [merlin](http://adarog.livejournal.com/tag/merlin)  
  
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Morgana isn't the only one who has dreams.

He hasn't lost any sleep. He doesn't see ominous images that must be portents of doom. They don't wake him screaming and half the castle with him. But Merlin has dreams that leave him mystified. When he wakes up having to use the chamber pot, or when the morning light touches his eyes and Gaius's voice touches his ears, his dreams hang strangely vivid before his eyes.

He dreams of an island in the midst of a great sea, of a temple of white stone filled with chanting priests and priestesses in white and gold robes, of ships that flee on wings of sail, red, blue, sea-green, as the waves like cliffs thunder out from where the island was. He dreams of a little band of people, their once gorgeous robes stained with sea water and bedraggled with wear, struggling ashore on a green coast, wandering an empty countryside that he recognizes as Albion. He dreams of a man in red robes with gold serpents for bracelets and a woman in blue with silver in her hair.

He dreams of being much older than he is, almost as old as Gaius. He sees a bearded and white-haired man walking with a tall staff whom he knows to be himself. There is no Arthur. He is Uther's friend, counsellor, court magician, sometimes even Uther's lover, in these dreams. He dreams of crossing a narrow causeway in a storm with Uther and two or three knights, entering the old castle of Tintagel on the Cornish coast, and bringing Uther into Igraine's arms. He dreams of Igraine, whom he has never seen, a beautiful laughing red-haired woman with blue eyes and a warm smile like her son's.

He dreams of battles that Uther wins, of using his magic openly to help. He dreams of long forest rambles in woods he has never seen, of conversations with trees and stones and beautiful women who sit by still green woodland lakes. He dreams of a tower with many windows from which he watches the stars.

One night he dreams that Uther is dead, poisoned by a rival. Igraine is weeping, keening her grief. He walks off into the night with a tiny bundle in his arms: baby Arthur, red-faced with wisps of golden hair and intense blue eyes that never leave Merlin's face. By morning he arrives at an old manor and places Arthur in the arms of a kind motherly woman his waking mind does not know. Her husband is a knight; they have a small son already. Their lands are fruitful, but the manor is far from Camelot or any settled place. Arthur will be safe.

Over and over Merlin wakes with those words in his mind. "Arthur will be safe." Safe from what? he wonders. Safe how? He's at Arthur's side every day, warding off more dangers than he can count without ever letting the prince know magic is on his side. And Arthur is a good fighter, with so much courage and heart; no one could defeat him in a fair fight. It's all the *unfair* fighting Merlin has to protect him from, the magic Uther thinks he has banished for good.

Sometimes he wonders how it would feel to be able to use his magic openly in Arthur's defense, or to share with Arthur some of the things the magic teaches him. When he has a moment to breathe, he can hear plants growing, trees talking to one another, the nervous chatter of a rabbit on a forest path, the sly humor of the fox in pursuit of the rabbit. He can see colors around people sometimes that match their personalities; Arthur is red and gold like the Pendragon arms, Morgana is green and blue shading into violet, Gaius is a vivid cornflower blue, Gwen a warm rose. He doesn't like to look at Uther because Uther's colors are dark like smoke. But with one thing and another, he hasn't time to concentrate on those things, let alone to share them. He works hard and protects Arthur and collapses into bed and falls asleep and he dreams, dreams that things are different, that Arthur grows up without Uther, a boy under an apple tree, falling into a stream, running ahead of a bull, and Merlin comes to him as a friend, a guest, a teacher, and the boy grows up and Nimueh, smiling and benevolent, gives him the sword that Merlin tossed into the water so Uther couldn't have it.

Sometimes he thinks he sees silver on Morgana's black hair, gold serpents on Arthur's arms. Some nights he dreams the waves are coming again, the shaking of the island and the waves rising up to blot out the sky. It's wrong. It's all wrong. That's not the way things are. But Merlin wonders, as he fetches Arthur's breakfast and helps the prince dress for the day: Is it how things are supposed to be? Or how they were, or how they will be?


End file.
